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Edge Products

Business situation

Edge Products was contracted to re-platform the terminal display that plugs into a ‘black box’ type device for inside heavy vehicles – similar to those found in aircraft. Basically, the device called a waySmart™, encourages safer driving habits and with GPS functionality, helps improve operational efficiency.

The waySmart™ terminal had originally been developed on a technology platform which had proven to be costly and hard to maintain. Tony Pitman, Senior Engineer explains that because of Edge Products expertise with device terminal displays, they were tasked with the job of looking for an alternative, more cost-effective solution which could be easily updated.

The Solution

A couple of options were looked at including Windows CE but based on previous experience Tony discounted this as the cost advantage was negligible. Freescale and Tahoe were the two .NET Micro Framework options available at the time, but the Meridian CPU from Device Solutions had the best features and functionality and would enable the project to be quickly deployed. It also allowed a large visual display with many buttons and LED’s to be connected which ensured all the waySmart™ features could be activated. Most importantly, it enabled easy off-site update of the firmware.

Development time halved

Tony is clear that it would have been extremely difficult to find another supplier with the same level of responsiveness as Device Solutions.He’s certain this factor alone, ensured the project was completed in 6 months not the year it would have taken had they chosen a similar product from another supplier.

Outstanding Company expertise

Without reservation he states that, “If I had to undertake the same project now, I would probably still choose Device Solutions for the simple reason I have absolute confidence in the expertise of the company behind the product.” He reckons it’s rare these days to pick up the phone and talk directly to an engineer and get fast results, “we almost always had answers the same day or within 24 hours – it doesn’t get much better than that.”